Isn’t it weird how you can be so hurt by someone but still want them and think about them? It’s frustrating and absolutely maddening but it’s normal. The thing to remember is that you don’t have to allow him to take up space in your mind or heart. Enough is enough! Here’s how to stop giving a damn about the guy who screwed you over.
- Give yourself permission to bawl. Is there anything more healing than crying your heart out? Sometimes that’s exactly what you need to do. Don’t feel bad for doing it either. This is how you feel and you need to let it out, otherwise, those feelings are going to sneak up on you at a later stage and make you realize you haven’t worked through them.
- Tell yourself what you’d tell your BFF. If your BFF came to you and told you that she can’t stop wishing things had been different with her ex, chances are you’d remind her that she’s so much better than that and she should focus on herself. Now tell yourself those things because they’re true!
- Stop crying and distract yourself. You can only cry and pick through your feelings for so long before it becomes stressful, especially if you’re going around in circles. Sometimes the best thing to do is find things you love to distract you from thinking so much.
- Make yourself number one. You probably feel like you were last on that guy’s list, but put yourself at the top of yours! Now’s the perfect opportunity to do things for yourself, whatever that may be. To one person it could be getting their hair dyed a new color while to another person it could be training for a marathon. Whatever makes you feel even a tiny bit of excitement is what you should pursue to make you see the beauty of life again. There’s a whole life waiting to be enjoyed without that loser around.
- Put on the power tunes. It’s time to pump music from Beyonce, Taylor Swift, or Adele through the apartment to make you remember you’re not the only one to have experienced this before. Honestly, sometimes singing along to a song that feels like it was written for your situation is a great way of eliminating those feelings and thoughts. You might even have to scream, instead of sing. It’ll make you feel better, I promise, and usually feels more empowering than crying.
- Cut him out for good. Now’s not the time to keep the guy on your socials so that you can keep an eye on what he’s doing or see if he’s moving on. That’ll just keep him in your mind when he’s got to go! Don’t feel guilty for cutting off all contact. He didn’t feel guilty when he walked away, now did he? Exactly.
- Remember the bad times. The end of a relationship or crush is weirdly the time when you’ll think of all the amazing times you shared with the person. Conveniently, we forget about all the drama, the late-night arguments, the times he went AWOL, or how he sent annoying “k” replies via text that made our blood pressure spike. Guess what? Now’s the time to remember those things. Write them in a journal if you have to so you can go back to them whenever you feel the pinch of nostalgia return.
- Choose your own happiness. It’s easy to think you could’ve been happy with the guy if he didn’t leave, but that’s basically like saying he had to be a completely different guy. Look, what happened happened and it sucked. Why would you want to continue wasting time on it? You deserve to be happy and you’re not going to get that by hoping the guy will come back. I guarantee you that you wouldn’t be happy if he did.
- Ditch your FOMO. Are you worried that you’re the one before The One? Are you worried that he’s going to learn from your relationship and be a better man for the next woman he dates, making you miss out on all that? This is all fiction! The truth is that people rarely change. How he was with you is how he’s going to be. What, is he going to suddenly stop being moody or a cheat? Nope, not going to happen.
- Think about what you need from a relationship. You might think you need him, but what you really need is to learn from the experience. What do you want moving forward? Chances are after being with someone who hurt you, you’re going to have to take stock of what will have to be present in a relationship to make you feel happy. When doing this, it will help you to focus on your ex’s negative traits so that you remind yourself of what you don’t want in your next relationship. You’ll soon see you’re so much better off and that feeling will outweigh any fantasies of getting back together with him.
